{"id":14,"date":"2013-06-20T16:56:00","date_gmt":"2013-06-20T16:56:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/more-androids-with-a-dash-of-grandmother\/"},"modified":"2013-06-20T16:56:00","modified_gmt":"2013-06-20T16:56:00","slug":"more-androids-with-a-dash-of-grandmother","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/more-androids-with-a-dash-of-grandmother\/","title":{"rendered":"More Androids with a Dash of Grandmother"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
<\/a><\/div>\n

iD<\/i><\/a>
Madelaine Ashby<\/a>
Angry Robot Books<\/a>
UK Print<\/b>
Date:<\/span> 4th July 2013
ISBN:<\/span> 9780857663108
Format:<\/span> Medium (B-Format) Paperback
R.R.P.:<\/span> \u00a38.99
US\/CAN Print<\/b>
Date:<\/span> 25th June 2013
ISBN:<\/span> 9780857663115
Format:<\/span> Large (Trade) Paperback
R.R.P.:<\/span> US$14.99 CAN$16.99
Ebook<\/b>
Date:<\/span> 25th June 2013
ISBN:<\/span> 9780857663122
Format:<\/span> Epub & Mobi
R.R.P.:<\/span> \u00a35.49 \/ US$6.99<\/p>\n

I reviewed the initial novel <\/a>in this series, vN<\/i>, last year and was quite impressed by it.\u00a0 It held my interest when I wasn’t able to read it for days at a time.\u00a0 As a result, I was looking forward to the sequel.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately (for me, at least), the sequel didn’t live up to its predecessor.\u00a0 Part of that is because the viewpoint character in this one is Javier rather than Amy.\u00a0 Javier doesn’t interest me as much as Amy and her grandmother Portia do. Portia isn’t dead, BTW.
<\/a>
The setup is basically this.\u00a0 Amy and Javier have built an artificial island in the middle of the ocean.\u00a0 After repelling an attack by unknown assailants, they’re visited by a human representative of the church that created them.\u00a0 (Recall that the androids were originally created by a sect so that those not raptured will have companions.)\u00a0 The guy arrives on a supply boat which was forced to transport him to the island to allegedly investigate the raid.<\/p>\n

This is where my suspension of disbelief begins to break down.\u00a0 Amy and Javier don’t trust him, but they let him have free reign of the island.\u00a0 Some of this is intentional, and some isn’t.\u00a0 The guy deliberately puts himself in danger by going into a restricted area.\u00a0 Why he wasn’t restricted to the boat he came on, I don’t know.\u00a0 It’s obvious no one wants him there.<\/p>\n

He also rapes Javier and forces him to do something that destroys the island.\u00a0 The rest of the book is about how Javier tries to reverse the damage he’s done.\u00a0 Javier travels about blowjobbing<\/strike> doing whatever he feels he has to in order to accomplish his objectives.\u00a0 <\/p>\n

SPOILER ALERT:<\/p>\n

Where the story really went off the rails for me was in the final confrontation.\u00a0 Having found some of his children, Javier discovers that his daughter, whom he’s never met, thinks highly of the man who started the whole chain of events (He’s caring for two of Javier’s children.) and despises him.\u00a0\u00a0 Yet in just a few sentences Javier is able to completely switch her allegiance.<\/p>\n

Also, androids have a built-in failsafe mechanism that causes them to shut down whenever a human is threatened or hurt.\u00a0 A big deal is made of this throughout the book.\u00a0 It’s the failsafe mechanism that allows Javier to be manipulated initially.\u00a0 I found Javier’s rationalization around the failsafe in the final confrontation a little too convenient.<\/p>\n

END SPOILER<\/p>\n

On the positive side, Ashby’s writing, which was quite good to begin with, has improved.\u00a0 The story moves along smoothly and quickly.\u00a0 The pacing is superb.\u00a0 The dialogue reads like people talking, not words put in characters’ mouths by an author.\u00a0 The flashback scenes of Javier’s childhood were handled well and didn’t detract from the story.<\/p>\n

This book won’t be for everyone.\u00a0 vN<\/i> was from the point of a four year old.\u00a0 As such, there wasn’t a lot of sex, and no graphic sex, in the book, although the violent content was high.\u00a0 iD<\/i> is very different.\u00a0 There’s plenty of graphic content, both sex and violence, with more of the former than the latter.\u00a0 (Or maybe I’m just desensitized to violence.)\u00a0 If you’re easily offended, or if you’re squeamish, you might want to give this one a pass.\u00a0 Of course, everyone’s tastes are different, and your mileage may vary.<\/p>\n

One thing that did intrigue me were the hints Ashby dropped about generation ships and space travel.\u00a0 There’s clearly a war between vN and humans coming.\u00a0 I’m wondering if the solution is going to be the vN leaving Earth.\u00a0 We’ll have to wait for the sequel to find out.<\/p>\n

I’d like to thank Angry Robot Books for the review copy. <\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

iDMadelaine AshbyAngry Robot BooksUK PrintDate: 4th July 2013ISBN: 9780857663108Format: Medium (B-Format) PaperbackR.R.P.: \u00a38.99US\/CAN PrintDate: 25th June 2013ISBN: 9780857663115Format: Large (Trade) PaperbackR.R.P.: US$14.99 CAN$16.99EbookDate: 25th June 2013ISBN: 9780857663122Format: Epub & MobiR.R.P.: \u00a35.49 \/ US$6.99 I reviewed the initial novel in this series, vN, last year and was quite impressed by it.\u00a0 It held my interest when […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10,11,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-androids","category-angry-robot-books","category-madelilne-ashby"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3P5pJ-e","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/adventuresfantastic.com\/futurespastandpresent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}